Warming allows Northwest Passage cable

Dan Joling, Associated Press

Published
4:00 am PST, Friday, January 22, 2010

Global warming has melted so much Arctic ice that a telecommunication group is moving forward with a project that was unthinkable just a few years ago: laying underwater fiber optic cable between Tokyo and London by way of the Northwest Passage.

The proposed system would nearly cut in half the time it takes to send messages from the United Kingdom to Asia, said Walt Ebell, CEO of Kodiak-Kenai Cable Co. The route is the shortest underwater path between Tokyo and London.

The quicker transmission time is important in the financial world where milliseconds can count in executing profitable trades and transactions. "Speed is the crux," Ebell said. "You're cutting the delay from 140 milliseconds to 88 milliseconds."

The project, while still facing many significant obstacles, also serves as an example of how warming has altered the Arctic landscape in profound ways.

Summer sea ice melted to its lowest recorded level in late 2007, and forecasters predict a continued downward spiral. The result is a path through the Northwest Passage, the Arctic route connecting the Atlantic and Pacific that has fascinated explorers for centuries.

The project, called ArcticLink, is not without hurdles - namely the estimated construction price of $1.2 billion, said Alan Mauldin, research director at TeleGeography Research, a Washington telecommunications market research company.

The project will need telecommunications companies to buy a piece of the capacity. Those companies will make that decision largely based on demand from financial companies.